Saturday 29 November 2008

Morgan Kane #23

DUEL IN TOMBSTONE
as by Louis Masterson
Corgi, 1974 - originally published in Norway, 1968.

Only the legendary Wyatt Earp and his men had tamed the bloodiest territory in the West – Tombstone, Arizona. But now Earp was gone, his men scattered and living peaceful lives, the vermin were crawling back – outlaws for whom Tombstone was a haven from the law with the Mexican border nearby and the mountains to hole up in…

The day Morgan Kane rode into town as the new U.S. marshal a local newspaper reporter named “Red Kate” Coleman offered to write his obituary. But Kane had a lot more to worry about than a spiteful woman out for revenge. In every dark alley, on every rooftop was a gun waiting to shoot him down. Some of the most infamous outlaws in the old West had taken a liking to Tombstone and they weren’t about to give it up again without a fight…

The Morgan Kane books still rank as one of my favourite western series of all time, and this tale didn’t change my mind, even if Louis Masterson (Kjell Hallbing) has taken a few liberties with who was in Tombstone and when, and who killed who.

The book is set about five years after Earp left Tomsbstone and many famous names appear in the fast moving story, Buckskin Frank Leslie and John Ringo being two killed by Kane. There’s loads of action and well-drawn characters - most of which are bad, even the law. Kane has to take them on with only the help of fellow lawman Neal Brown and newspaperman John C. Clum.

If you can find a copy it’s well worth a look.

3 comments:

James Reasoner said...

This is one of the few Morgan Kane books I've read, but I remember liking it.

Gary Dobbs/Jack Martin said...

Louis Masterson - That's another name that was familiar from my childhood but almost fogotten now.

Steve M said...

Masterson's work is well worth checking out - in my opinion - just a shame only the first 41 books have been printed in English: that's just under half of them.